But Why Should He Warn Us of Everything?

by Laurie Klein

Overnight, new toadstools shoulder through sodden grass the way sorrows emerge, one after another. Traveler, in a season doubly scented by windfall apples and creeping rot, please sidestep the lone wet leaf beaded with tiny mirrors. Shifting glints might suggest echoes of untended disagreements, as each pendulous tremor, evoked by a footfall, nudges up against all that remains un-cried. .

Laurie Klein is the author of Where the Sky Opens (Poeima/Cascade). A past winner of the Thomas Merton prize, her work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. She lives in the Pacific Northwest.